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The German Chapter of the International Association of Landscape Ecology (IALE) connects landscape researchers, planners, and other interested persons to support a scientifically and planning-related sound development of human-environment relations. IALE-D supports scientific principles of landscape science and sustainable landscape management, their application in practice, as well as the communication of landscape ecological questions.
The International Association for Landscape Ecology was founded in 1982 in the Slovakian town Piestany, to promote transdisciplinary research and exchange of experience in the field of landscape ecology as a scientific basis for landscape planning and environmental management. It strives for close contact between natural and social sciences, as well as for a connection between science and practice. On this basis, theories, models, and empirical data can be combined and merged so that a better understanding of landscape and sustainable landscape management becomes possible.
The foundation of our chapter “IALE-D“ took place at May 5, 1999 in Basel (Switzerland). Like other regional chapters, IALE-D builds on the expertise of its members, their ideas, and new ways of cooperation.
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Displaying 51 - 53 of 53Effects of topography and surface roughness in analyses of landscape structure –
Topography and relief variability play a key role in ecosystem functioning and structuring. However, the most commonly used concept to relate pattern to process in landscape ecology, the so-called patch-corridor-matrix model, perceives the landscape as a planimetric surface. As a consequence, landscape metrics, used as numerical descriptors of the spatial arrangement of landscape mosaics, generally do not allow for the examination of terrain characteristics and may even produce erroneous results, especially in mountainous areas.
Statistical Classification of Terrestrial and Marine Ecosystems for Environmental Planning
E nvironmental planning is an instrument for the operationalisation of the precautionary principle in environmental law and, to this end, must rely on maps depicting the spatial patterns of ecological attributes of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems and of environmental change effects, respectively. In this context, different mapping techniques are presented by example of three case studies covering terrestrial, coastal and marine environments. The first case study was selected to demonstrate how to compute an ecological land classification of Germany by means of CART.
Treeline advance - driving processes and adverse factors
The general trend of climatically-driven treeline advance is modified by regional, local and temporal variations. Treelines will not advance in a closed front parallel to the shift of any isotherm to higher elevations and more northern latitudes. The effects of varying topography on site conditions and the after-effects of historical disturbances by natural and anthropogenic factors may override the effects of slightly higher average temperatures. Moreover, the varying treeline-forming species respond in different ways to a changing climate.